THE WILLIAM “DON” JOHNSTON MEMORIAL BRIDGE

Standing below the new bridge on the wooden bridge it replaced, Chris Johnston delivered a heartfelt tribute to his late grandpa. Like the bridge, his grandfather was steady support to his family, the company he founded, his employees and the Henderson community.

“As the bridge is there supporting you all, he so supported us,” said Chris, who is PTTG’s vice president of risk management. “Never afraid to trust, teach, give more than a second chance, and help when we might have thought there was no one else.”

Don’s life and work opened the door for many others to build careers and live out their dreams.

“Don Johnston was a driven, innovative entrepreneur who cared deeply about those who ran the race alongside him,” said Dylan Phelps, PTTG’s chief wellness officer. “His biological family came first. He built his life and businesses around them, and he was kind enough to adopt hundreds of others into his fold throughout his career.”

Don successfully built and ran multiple corporations, but his most rewarding venture was building meaningful relationships with his employees, whom he considered extended family.

“The evidence of that could be seen almost any day of the week as friends and present and past employees would visit him and share laughs and memories,” Dylan said. “He was the catalyst that created the Pittsburg Tank & Tower Group of companies. Even more, he was the patriarch that nurtured the PTTG family.”

Planning for the bridge began immediately after Don Johnston passed away on Jan. 2, 2018. A light bulb turned on in Allstate President Keegan O’Daniel’s head during a brainstorming session on ways to honor Don and the Johnston family.  Keegan remembered that Audubon Park was in the process of replacing some of its bridges that connected walking trails.  So why not create a bridge that would recognize Don’s life and his contributions to the community?  After all, wouldn’t a steel bridge be the perfect symbol and tribute to the life that Don lived?

Money to secure the opportunity to build the bridge was raised through PTTG employees’ generous donations. As a united family, PTTG employees presented PTTG President Ben Johnston and the Johnston family the bridge official documents at Don’s remembrance service.

Employees pitched in at every opportunity to make Ben’s vision for a bridge honoring his late father a reality. The company’s talented engineers and drafters took Ben’s idea and turned them into blueprints, and the bridge was fabricated at the company’s Allstate Tower facility.  On a hot and humid day in late June 2018, more than 60 employees voluntarily gathered early on a Saturday morning in Audubon Park to dig the piers for the new bridge and carry heavy bags of concrete to the trail.  The concrete was set later that day.  Employees bent, bolted and welded the steel structure together.  Finally, a crew erected the impressive steel bridge in Audubon Park.